My Snow Angels

On a bitterly cold hillside in Maine, author Lili Wright celebrated Valentine’s Day with a true act of love.

I HAVE BEEN GOING TO THE SAME SPOT in Maine for 50 years, but until recently I’d never seen the island in winter. My family are what’s known as summer people, vacationers who steal sunny July days, then race back to our real lives — in my case, teaching college in Indiana.

That changed the fall my father succumbed to an inoperable brain tumor. Dad had never chosen a burial spot. He had never interred my mother’s ashes, either. Before he died, I suggested we bury them both on a grassy bluff overlooking our beach in Maine. Sacred space. We’d add a bench, I told him. I would visit.

“That sounds nice,” Dad said, progress from the first time I’d mentioned the idea. Then, he’d simply said, “That sounds cold.”

For months, twin urns sat in my closet waiting for summer, and it bothered me. My father had been claustrophobic, and it seemed wrong that his remains were hunkered down in the dark. So in February, I decided to go to Maine to spread my parents’ ashes. Not all. Just a little. Enough to let their souls free.

This is the work we adults do. We commemorate. We arrange. We make hard decisions. Overseeing the afterlife of my parents was a responsibility I took seriously. So when my flight was canceled and I had to rebook for the following weekend, meaning I’d miss Valentine’s Day with my husband and children at home, I didn’t back down.

Dad was right about the cold. It was 7°F when my plane landed in Portland. By the time I climbed to the upper deck of the ferry, night had fallen. The moon resembled a frosted golden slipper. I could see my breath.